Henry Owens pitches PawSox in playoffs

Lefthanded Red Sox phenom Henry Owens won his third game in four tries at triple-A Sunday night, hurling six innings in Pawtucket's 10-4 win over the Rochester Red Wings.

Owens, of course was the Eastern League Pitcher of the Year for his season at double-A Portland, where he was 14-4 with a 2.60 earned run average. Despite being promoted to Pawtucket on August 1, Owens still ended up leading the Eastern League in wins, ERA and strikeouts (126).

The PawSox (79-64) clinched their fourth straight playoff berth with last night's win, and will open the International League playoffs Wednesday night, when they host Syracuse at 7:05 p.m. The best of five series will continue at McCoy Stadium Thursday night, before shifting to Syracuse for the next three games (if necessary). Entering Sunday's game, Pawtucket had a two game edge on the Red Wings, Minnesota's top farm club, for the IL's wildcard berth, but if the teams had finished the season tied, Rochester owned the tiebreaker.

As for Owens, he had spots where he looked invincible, such as the second inning when he struck out the side, including whiffing slugger Chris Colabello on a 74-miles-per-hour breaking ball. But then Owens lost the groove in the third, walking two men to open the inning, before Aaron Hicks blasted a double to left field to score Rochester's first run. Owens would yield another rbi-double, to DH Josmil Pinto, before escaping the inning.

The 6-6, 205-pound southpaw was pretty effective after that, holding the Red Wings to two hits over his final three frames. But one of those hits was a mammoth home run to left from leadoff hitter Eric Farris in the fifth inning.

Owens, who threw 95 pitches (63 for strikes), left having pitched six innings, allowing three hits and two walks, while fanning nine. He was charged with four runs, all of them earned, but ran his Pawtucket record to 3-1 before 9443 holiday weekend fans who had to sit out a seventh inning rain delay that stretched out to two hours, 28 minutes. Most of the crowd left when it was announced the postgame fireworks were cancelled by the rain, and perhaps a hundred people remained when the 6 p.m. game concluded some just after midnight.

Pawtucket's 79th win was greeted by players celebrating on the mound after Drake Britton had come on after the rain delay to secure the victory. Four straight seasons of qualifying for the postseason is a new mark of excellence for the team. The IL playoffs only include the three division winners and one wild card, and Pawtucket had gotten into the 2012 playoffs as the wild card before going all the way to the IL championship.

Offensively the PawSox's 13-hit attack was paced by Milton's Alex Hassan, who collected three singles and three runs batted in, while DH Ryan Lavarnway, continuing his hot hand since returning from the disabled list on August 28, added two hits and three rbi.

Page 2 of 2 - Hassan, who endured some early season bad luck at the plate, got a bit of a gift in the seventh inning, as he topped a slow roller towards the mound. Coming off the mound, Rochester hurler Deolis Guerra lost his footing and slipped on the wet grass, landing unceremoniously on his keister. Hassan would come around and score the tenth run a bit later, after new/old acquisition Ivan DeJesus Jr. worked Guerra for a ten-pitch at bat, before slashing a single to center. Hassan, with his three hits Sunday, now has 31-multi-hit games for Pawtucket.